Chip card personalization whereby data individual to the card and/or person is transferred to the relevant chip card has hitherto been carried out mainly in secure personalization centers on the premises of a chip card manufacturer, certification agency or trusted service provider.
In such a personalization center, personalization data predefinable on a customer-specific basis, e.g. a user name, account number or other customer-specific data or applications, is transferred to the chip card. The personalization centers are usually protected against tampering by the use of electronic, mechanical security mechanisms and/or organizational measures, as security-relevant data (e.g. the chip card user's personal data, PINs, etc.) is processed there, and disclosure of information to unauthorized persons and influencing of the personalization process by unauthorized persons must be prevented.
If, for example, in the case of chip cards used for personal identification, maximum security is required, in particular to prevent tampering with or falsification of the data stored on the chip card, personalization has hitherto mainly been carried out in secure personalization centers.
Personalization in a non-secure environment outside personalization centers has hitherto only been carried out for chip cards with low security requirements.
Personalizing a chip card usually includes activating one or more applications on the chip card together with generating security keys and/or security key pairs, e.g. so-called symmetric keys or RSA keys (RSA: encryption algorithm named after the inventors Rivest, Shamir and Adleman). Generating security key pairs has proved very time consuming compared to the remaining personalization steps. The number of chip cards processed in any given period in a personalization center is significantly affected by the time required for generating the security keys of the relevant chip cards.
Personalization of a chip card often cannot be completed in a single personalization session, as at the time of issue of the chip card it is not yet fully known which applications are to be transferred to the chip card and installed on the chip card. Moreover, in the case of multi-application chip cards which may contain a plurality of applications, it is necessary to activate applications over the lifetime of the chip card. According to the related art, the chip card must be returned to the secure personalization center for this purpose, if the relevant security specifications so require.